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billbenson
02-06-2009, 04:25 PM
Hopefully this isn't a redundant post. I made a similar one which I believe is on a different forum.

WordPress allows for a static index page. Do the users here tend to do that or write an index page and then link to a wordpress subdirectory?

orion_joel
02-06-2009, 08:13 PM
On a new site i am working on i have opted for a static front page in wordpress. I just found it easier to maintain a consistent look then creating a separate page.

billbenson
02-07-2009, 10:24 AM
One thing you can always do for something like that Joel, is write a page in the cms (in this case wordpress), copy the code, edit it as you see fit and save it as a static page. Other than a couple of path problems for your css file etc, you are using it as a page generator. I've don't that on a number of occasions.

orion_joel
02-07-2009, 07:27 PM
Do you mean as in write a page, then copy the view source, and adjust the links for the CSS file, as long as it is on the same server shouldnt be to hard to reconnect the CSS

billbenson
02-08-2009, 02:24 AM
Exactly, you are just using the cms to create a static page for you.

orion_joel
02-08-2009, 06:08 AM
Not a bad idea, but is there any real benefit in doing this and not just keeping it all in the CMS itself.

For example Wordpress doesn't do a bad job of a static home page.

billbenson
02-08-2009, 06:42 AM
I did it when I first started using oscommerce so I could go in and optimize landing pages for adwords ads. I eventually just hacked oscommerce so it wasn't necessary anymore. If the seo is as good as everyone says in WP, the only reason I can think of is if you want to do a static index page. There might be a page or two every once in a while that doesn't exactly fit your theme?

orion_joel
02-08-2009, 07:40 PM
Makes sense, and is good to know that you have options if you find that you may need to take advantage of them. I may just give it a trial run to see what i can come up with as a test.

vangogh
02-09-2009, 10:23 AM
Depends on the site, but when I've been using static home pages more and more lately. WP makes it so easy so when I build a site on WordPress that's less blog and more static site then I'll use a static home page.

Bill unless you want the home page to have a different look than the rest I don't really see the advantages of coding it as a page outside of WP. And even if you wanted a different look you could create a new page template within your theme and still have WP saving the content as it always does.

orion_joel
02-09-2009, 08:01 PM
That was actually one of my thoughts, if you have a CMS/blog how is it useful to take the actual content that you may want to edit at some point and put it outside the cms structure, which means you then have to manually alter if need be.

billbenson
02-14-2009, 10:11 AM
Bill unless you want the home page to have a different look than the rest I don't really see the advantages of coding it as a page outside of WP. And even if you wanted a different look you could create a new page template within your theme and still have WP saving the content as it always does.

From everything I hear about WP, I agree. Oddball situations do come up however, and its one option to consider.

vangogh
02-14-2009, 11:25 AM
Absolutely. There's certainly nothing wrong with having pages coded outside WP. The more I learn about WordPress though, the more I see you can probably create all those pages inside of WP.